As sealing materials (e.g., a gasket and a packing) used in various applications, sealing materials made from fluorine rubbers are known. A fluorine rubber sealing material has relatively satisfactory heat resistance and plasma resistance (i.e., resistance to decomposition with plasma), and therefore has been used as a sealing material for use in a plasma etching device or a plasma CVD device constituting a semiconductor manufacturing device, such as a sealing material for maintaining a process chamber for treating a wafer therein in a vacuum state.
A fluorine rubber sealing material has also been used, for example, in a gate section that partitions between a chamber and a delivery section in a semiconductor manufacturing device. In this case, since compression and release of pressure are repeated in the gate section, the sealing material is required to have proper mechanical strength.
The mechanical strength of a fluorine rubber sealing material can be improved by adding an inorganic filler. However, when the sealing material containing the inorganic filler is used in a semiconductor manufacturing device as mentioned above, even if the fluorine rubber having excellent plasma resistance is used, the fluorine rubber component in the sealing material is often etched with plasma under a severe plasma environment. In this case, a problem may be caused that the inorganic filler contained in the fluoroelastomer is scattered in the chamber (particles are formed) and therefore the contamination of the chamber or the defect of a semiconductor product is likely to occur.
Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 2000-119468 (PTD 1) discloses a fluorinated elastomer composition which does not contain a particulate filler that causes the formation of particles. Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 2005-113035 (PTD 2) describes that the compounding amounts of a non-organic resin filler and an organic resin filler are reduced extremely in a fluorine rubber sealing material for the purpose of preventing the formation of particles.